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It's interesting to note the difference in communication styles when company PR teams respond to requests for comments. Fiat Chrysler and Chevy both responded i

It's interesting to note the difference in communication styles when company PR teams respond to requests for comments. Fiat Chrysler and Chevy both responded in predictable marketroid speak, complete with extensive use of passive voice and grand, hand-wavey platitudes "We care committed to blah blah blah" "Quality is of the greatest importance blah blah blah" "blah blah above industry average blah blah blah" "blah blah launching with excellence". And then there's Tesla: "We fixed issue XYZ, which affected people in exactly this particular way." "We proactively send bulletins and over-the-air fixes." "This particular issue was for this particular year, and has long since been fixed."

mrtksn 7y ago
Oh definately, I wonder why these giants cannot replicate the Tesla PR? This is probably Tesla's strongest point, having a problem with the product you paind for and not having personalized response makes you feel powerless while response from someone who seems to understand the problem and the issues it creates is a such a huge difference even if the issue is not resolved. I always forgive companies that did sloppy job but cared enough to appologise and explain why it happend. You don't have to have a celebrity CEO to do that.
- andreskytt 7y ago
  It has proven effectively impossible to sustainably project an incorrect image of a company. It’s not that they can’t do PR, their entire culture looks like that
justapassenger 7y ago
Words are cheap. They’re under investigation for possibly hiding recall and issuing OTA instead that surprised people with sudden range loss (https://www.businessinsider.com/nhtsa-investigating-tesla-update-hurt-model-s-model-x-range-2019-10?r=US&IR=T https://www.businessinsider.com/nhtsa-investigating-tesla-up...) They force customers to go over arbitration to fix yellowing entertainment screen on cars as young as few months. They tell people it’s normal wear and tear due to using cat in the sun (https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/yellow-screen-force-tesla-to-replace-it.158197/ https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/yellow-screen-force-...) Their service centers are over the capacity for years and cars can be stuck waiting for repairs and parts for months.
- TheSpiceIsLife 7y ago
  Perhaps the grandparent comment was actually talking about the quality of Tesla’s Public Relations department. Otherwise it would strike me as odd that someone would boost a vehicle manufacturer that doesn’t sell spare parts, in a thread on vehicle reliability. Edited a few words to better express my point.
  - linksnapzz 7y ago
    The difference is, the other automakers have decades of experience tailoring public pronouncements so as not to provide fodder for trial lawyers. Hence the vaporous noncommunication. Tesla hasn't been sued as much yet, but they'll get there eventually.
    - kiba 7y ago
      The PR department may have learned the wrong lesson from their environment.
    - smnrchrds 7y ago
      Unless their PR and legal department are exclusively staffed by recent graduates with zero work or real-world experience, it shouldn't matter whether or not they have been sued. It's not like every corporation starts figuring everything out by trial and error, never referring to literature or hiring experienced professionals.
      - linksnapzz 7y ago
        Yeah, I would've thought the same thing about their manufacturing & labor relations depts., and yet...here we are.
  - ChrisClark 7y ago
    Buy all the spare parts you want here: https://epc.tesla.com https://epc.tesla.com Or just walk into a service center. Tesla now undercuts all third party prices on parts.
w-m 7y ago
I found this part very interesting: "In fact, the quality of brand-new Model X vehicles today is 3.5 times better than the quality of brand new Model X cars from 2015.". (I have no idea what "quality" means here, and how you can put a number on that, that rises 3.5x, but that's beside the point). With one sentence, Tesla is telling 2015 customers that they got screwed over, and future customers that they should wait 4 years after a new model comes out before buying it, because they need that time to figure out all the quality issues.
- ianai 7y ago
  Isn’t that somewhat standard practice in tech? It’s an industry that experienced exponential growth for decades.
- arethuza 7y ago
  That rule applies to pretty much any car though - having bought a completely new model of BMW when it first came out I would never do that again, mind you I would never buy a BMW again! Personally I'd wait at least a year before buying any new model of car.
  - thrill 7y ago
    I bought one of the first BMW 328 convertibles off the line. I drove it 20 years with over 500,000 miles with minimal repairs - even the soft top was still working fine and looked "ok" when I finally hit a large pothole and totaled it.
- mojuba 7y ago
  The quality can be measured by cost of maintenance or more likely by the costs associated with warranty repairs (and product returns) incurred by the company.
  - luckydata 7y ago
    in this case quality just means how likely is a customer to experience issues covered by warranty in the first x days. That's usually called "initial quality" in the industry jargon. Model X was particularly bad off the gates, it had tons of issues especially with the stupid vertical doors that broke all the time.
mariorossi666 7y ago
> "This particular issue was for this particular year, and has long since been fixed." On the other hand, you don't have to fix a problem you haven't created. Most of Tesla problems are self inflicted. Moreover "Model X vehicles today is 3.5 times better than the quality of brand new Model X cars from 2015." According to which metric? It sounds a lot like "this is the fastest Mac ever built, 2.5x faster than the previous generation"[1] but on the market cheaper or faster options (or both) were already available. [1] in small writings "according to bench X and taking the best result. On average the improvement is about +0.3%"
- MayeulC 7y ago
  According to an article I read recently[1], they measure quality in rate of defects per car produced. According to this, we can get an idea of the scope of the improvements. [1]: https://arstechnica.com/cars/2019/11/customers-rave-about-model-3-in-new-bloomberg-survey/ https://arstechnica.com/cars/2019/11/customers-rave-about-mo...
  - mariorossi666 7y ago
    Thanks for adding the metrics. As much as I think they are doing a great job and deserve to be there, I've also never seen a car in the $40k range (more 50-60k euros on this side of the ocean) not being "a pleasure to drive" or not having a good customer service. For the same price I can buy this https://www.audi.it/it/web/it/modelli/a6/a6.html https://www.audi.it/it/web/it/modelli/a6/a6.html
notacoward 7y ago
"We fixed one issue" isn't really any more informative than "we're committed to quality" with respect to overall reliability. One issue out of how many? How many customers are affected by those others, and how severely? How long are fixes taking on average? Tesla's response might resonate better in a community notorious for confusing specificity with truth, but it's still just spin.
- rockarage 7y ago
  Obviously you did not read or understand the article. The article mentioned specific issues that CR attributed to reliability problems in car brands, and Tesla addressed those issues regarding their brand with very specific and informative answers. The other questions you mentioned were not brought up. Your comment is unreasonably critical, read and try to understand the article first.
  - notacoward 7y ago
    I did read and understand the article, but the point stands. Over-specificity is as much of a smokescreen tactic as over-generality. It's not "unreasonably critical" to point that out, unless "unreasonably" has more to do with the sacred-cow object of criticism instead of the substance. Also, both the start and end of your comment violate site guidelines. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
pflats 7y ago
I felt the opposite. Tesla's answer came across the worst to me, and reads to me with the over-specificity of a student making excuses for why their paper isn't done on time. > "It was a supplier-related issue". Passing the buck is really not a great look to start with. It makes the rest of the response seem like a series of excuses. Tesla chose the supplier. Tesla built and inspected and sold and shipped the car with those parts. This is a Tesla-related issue. The only time Tesla should mention a supplier issue is in response to, "why can't you sell me a car?" > "[It] did not pose any threat to vehicle safety". That's good, but this isn't the safety survey. > "[T]here was a[...] false service alert [... that was fixed] within two weeks of being reported". I'm not even sure how to react to this one. Bringing my car in to be told "false alarm" is really not reassuring. And two weeks to fix a false alert doesn't help me - I've probably already brought it in for service. > "This proactive approach to improved reliability is one of the reasons why Tesla is the highest rated car brand among consumers, according to Consumer Reports." (Paraphrased:) Our cars are the safest and best performing, and Model S is #1 in satisfaction. To me, blaming a supplier for the issues is a terrible way to start, and this is likewise a terrible closing. "You just fell in the rankings to come in 3rd to last in our reliability survey. Any comments?" "Our cars are the safest and fastest and we have always ranked #1 on your customer satisfaction survey." Those stats are undeniably good. They also make me think those are the stats the company cares about a lot more than reliability.
- woodandsteel 7y ago
  >Tesla chose the supplier. Tesla built and inspected and sold and shipped the car with those parts. This is a Tesla-related issue. They are new at mass manufacturing and no doubt learned a lesson from this incident. And that is the whole point of their response, unlike the other American manufacturers they are successfully working away at rapidly improving quality and reliability. And you are angry at them for that.
  - pflats 7y ago
    But Tesla didn't say "we're new at this and we learned from it". They said it was a "supplier-related issue" that has been "addressed for cars in the field" and "resolved [...] with fundamental design improvements". Nothing in the statement tells me that there won't be another "supplier-related issue" down the line. There should be controls in place for this.

mrtksn 7y ago

Oh definately, I wonder why these giants cannot replicate the Tesla PR? This is probably Tesla's strongest point, having a problem with the product you paind for and not having personalized response makes you feel powerless while response from someone who seems to understand the problem and the issues it creates is a such a huge difference even if the issue is not resolved. I always forgive companies that did sloppy job but cared enough to appologise and explain why it happend. You don't have to have a celebrity CEO to do that.

andreskytt 7y ago
It has proven effectively impossible to sustainably project an incorrect image of a company. It’s not that they can’t do PR, their entire culture looks like that

justapassenger 7y ago

Words are cheap. They’re under investigation for possibly hiding recall and issuing OTA instead that surprised people with sudden range loss (https://www.businessinsider.com/nhtsa-investigating-tesla-update-hurt-model-s-model-x-range-2019-10?r=US&IR=T https://www.businessinsider.com/nhtsa-investigating-tesla-up...) They force customers to go over arbitration to fix yellowing entertainment screen on cars as young as few months. They tell people it’s normal wear and tear due to using cat in the sun (https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/yellow-screen-force-tesla-to-replace-it.158197/ https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/yellow-screen-force-...) Their service centers are over the capacity for years and cars can be stuck waiting for repairs and parts for months.

TheSpiceIsLife 7y ago
Perhaps the grandparent comment was actually talking about the quality of Tesla’s Public Relations department. Otherwise it would strike me as odd that someone would boost a vehicle manufacturer that doesn’t sell spare parts, in a thread on vehicle reliability. Edited a few words to better express my point.
- linksnapzz 7y ago
  The difference is, the other automakers have decades of experience tailoring public pronouncements so as not to provide fodder for trial lawyers. Hence the vaporous noncommunication. Tesla hasn't been sued as much yet, but they'll get there eventually.
  - kiba 7y ago
    The PR department may have learned the wrong lesson from their environment.
  - smnrchrds 7y ago
    Unless their PR and legal department are exclusively staffed by recent graduates with zero work or real-world experience, it shouldn't matter whether or not they have been sued. It's not like every corporation starts figuring everything out by trial and error, never referring to literature or hiring experienced professionals.
    - linksnapzz 7y ago
      Yeah, I would've thought the same thing about their manufacturing & labor relations depts., and yet...here we are.
- ChrisClark 7y ago
  Buy all the spare parts you want here: https://epc.tesla.com https://epc.tesla.com Or just walk into a service center. Tesla now undercuts all third party prices on parts.

w-m 7y ago

I found this part very interesting: "In fact, the quality of brand-new Model X vehicles today is 3.5 times better than the quality of brand new Model X cars from 2015.". (I have no idea what "quality" means here, and how you can put a number on that, that rises 3.5x, but that's beside the point). With one sentence, Tesla is telling 2015 customers that they got screwed over, and future customers that they should wait 4 years after a new model comes out before buying it, because they need that time to figure out all the quality issues.

ianai 7y ago
Isn’t that somewhat standard practice in tech? It’s an industry that experienced exponential growth for decades.
arethuza 7y ago
That rule applies to pretty much any car though - having bought a completely new model of BMW when it first came out I would never do that again, mind you I would never buy a BMW again! Personally I'd wait at least a year before buying any new model of car.
- thrill 7y ago
  I bought one of the first BMW 328 convertibles off the line. I drove it 20 years with over 500,000 miles with minimal repairs - even the soft top was still working fine and looked "ok" when I finally hit a large pothole and totaled it.
mojuba 7y ago
The quality can be measured by cost of maintenance or more likely by the costs associated with warranty repairs (and product returns) incurred by the company.
- luckydata 7y ago
  in this case quality just means how likely is a customer to experience issues covered by warranty in the first x days. That's usually called "initial quality" in the industry jargon. Model X was particularly bad off the gates, it had tons of issues especially with the stupid vertical doors that broke all the time.

mariorossi666 7y ago

> "This particular issue was for this particular year, and has long since been fixed." On the other hand, you don't have to fix a problem you haven't created. Most of Tesla problems are self inflicted. Moreover "Model X vehicles today is 3.5 times better than the quality of brand new Model X cars from 2015." According to which metric? It sounds a lot like "this is the fastest Mac ever built, 2.5x faster than the previous generation"[1] but on the market cheaper or faster options (or both) were already available. [1] in small writings "according to bench X and taking the best result. On average the improvement is about +0.3%"

MayeulC 7y ago
According to an article I read recently[1], they measure quality in rate of defects per car produced. According to this, we can get an idea of the scope of the improvements. [1]: https://arstechnica.com/cars/2019/11/customers-rave-about-model-3-in-new-bloomberg-survey/ https://arstechnica.com/cars/2019/11/customers-rave-about-mo...
- mariorossi666 7y ago
  Thanks for adding the metrics. As much as I think they are doing a great job and deserve to be there, I've also never seen a car in the $40k range (more 50-60k euros on this side of the ocean) not being "a pleasure to drive" or not having a good customer service. For the same price I can buy this https://www.audi.it/it/web/it/modelli/a6/a6.html https://www.audi.it/it/web/it/modelli/a6/a6.html

notacoward 7y ago

"We fixed one issue" isn't really any more informative than "we're committed to quality" with respect to overall reliability. One issue out of how many? How many customers are affected by those others, and how severely? How long are fixes taking on average? Tesla's response might resonate better in a community notorious for confusing specificity with truth, but it's still just spin.

rockarage 7y ago
Obviously you did not read or understand the article. The article mentioned specific issues that CR attributed to reliability problems in car brands, and Tesla addressed those issues regarding their brand with very specific and informative answers. The other questions you mentioned were not brought up. Your comment is unreasonably critical, read and try to understand the article first.
- notacoward 7y ago
  I did read and understand the article, but the point stands. Over-specificity is as much of a smokescreen tactic as over-generality. It's not "unreasonably critical" to point that out, unless "unreasonably" has more to do with the sacred-cow object of criticism instead of the substance. Also, both the start and end of your comment violate site guidelines. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

pflats 7y ago

I felt the opposite. Tesla's answer came across the worst to me, and reads to me with the over-specificity of a student making excuses for why their paper isn't done on time. > "It was a supplier-related issue". Passing the buck is really not a great look to start with. It makes the rest of the response seem like a series of excuses. Tesla chose the supplier. Tesla built and inspected and sold and shipped the car with those parts. This is a Tesla-related issue. The only time Tesla should mention a supplier issue is in response to, "why can't you sell me a car?" > "[It] did not pose any threat to vehicle safety". That's good, but this isn't the safety survey. > "[T]here was a[...] false service alert [... that was fixed] within two weeks of being reported". I'm not even sure how to react to this one. Bringing my car in to be told "false alarm" is really not reassuring. And two weeks to fix a false alert doesn't help me - I've probably already brought it in for service. > "This proactive approach to improved reliability is one of the reasons why Tesla is the highest rated car brand among consumers, according to Consumer Reports." (Paraphrased:) Our cars are the safest and best performing, and Model S is #1 in satisfaction. To me, blaming a supplier for the issues is a terrible way to start, and this is likewise a terrible closing. "You just fell in the rankings to come in 3rd to last in our reliability survey. Any comments?" "Our cars are the safest and fastest and we have always ranked #1 on your customer satisfaction survey." Those stats are undeniably good. They also make me think those are the stats the company cares about a lot more than reliability.

woodandsteel 7y ago
>Tesla chose the supplier. Tesla built and inspected and sold and shipped the car with those parts. This is a Tesla-related issue. They are new at mass manufacturing and no doubt learned a lesson from this incident. And that is the whole point of their response, unlike the other American manufacturers they are successfully working away at rapidly improving quality and reliability. And you are angry at them for that.
- pflats 7y ago
  But Tesla didn't say "we're new at this and we learned from it". They said it was a "supplier-related issue" that has been "addressed for cars in the field" and "resolved [...] with fundamental design improvements". Nothing in the statement tells me that there won't be another "supplier-related issue" down the line. There should be controls in place for this.